allsorts

More blue

I'm still craving that perfect shade of deep, cool blue, and I've discovered that it's especially beautiful in the garden! These photos from among my flickr favorites. The first two are by Susie.

I wouldn't mind spending the morning puttering in this seaside cottage garden... 

Maybe find a place to sit and watch the birds (suncoil)...

Or stroll by a clever border edging of bottles (pandorea)...

Then follow a path and listen to a fountain (Leah H)...

And finally, sit awhile and enjoy the flowers (Cheryl Pedemonti).

Now wouldn't that make for a pleasant day?

Cheers,

Jenny

Blue Monday

Ahhhhh... blue. Not my mood, the color!

With our afternoon temperatures reaching 104° I can't help but crave lovely cool things, like these shade-loving hydrangea blossoms in the deepest coolest blues I've ever seen. These lured me in at Central Market and insisted on coming home with me (along with some phloxy friends). Our soil here is so alkaline that even if I could successfully grow them in the Texas heat, they would be pink instead of this amazing shade of ultramarine.

I had a hunch they would look great in the enamel pitcher I got last week at (where else) Ikea. The pitchers are wonderfully made, come in three sizes and look absolutely fantastic everywhere I put them.

The sun even cooperated so I could snap some pics in this corner of the dining room. Gosh, look at all the other things from Ikea in that photo!

And I've finally decided to get serious about learning how to take better images with my camera. I think that my frustration with camera issues is the main reason I haven't been blogging as much as I used to. I have ideas for posts all the time, but don't follow through because I don't like the photos. So I'm very happy to be finally addressing that.

Hope you have a truly wonderful week!

Cheers,

Jenny

Gates and gardens

I am so happy to show you (with permisson) these gorgeous images of garden gates in Carmel, California, by photographer Linda Yvonne. Check out her Carmel photoset here. She also has prints available.

While you're enjoying the tour, perhaps I'll babble on a bit...

I hope everyone had themselves a wonderful Mother's Day! Our weekend was a bit of a whirlwind. Saturday we did our usual weekly marketing extravaganza, then we zipped down to the farmer's market and crammed the back of the Explorer with flats and flats of bedding plants. Amazingly the guys tucked all those seedlings into their beds by dinnertime!

Sunday we were off early, to La Madeline for brekkies, then onward to Ikea! (what, isn't that every mother's dream destination? It is most certainly mine) I experienced excellent Mother's Day karma by finding this in the discounted section. Only the tiniest little boo boo where you'd never see it, and already assembled! Woot!

A quick trip back to the house to get a vehicle big enough to hold it, then a mad scramble to regroup for a visit with Ro's mom and the rest of the clan.

We topped off the day with a tasty supper of grilled tilapia while watching Amalie, then I had a nice long chat with Katy (who had spent the day setting up her thesis exhibit!).

They took the greatest care of me, I am a very lucky mom.

I hope you enjoyed this little peek into the gardens of Carmel!

Cheers,

Jenny

More May flowers

Wow again! We're up to ninety posters! I think after today I'll stop adding names to the sidebar since it is the 4th after all. Already feeling the energy that comes with rising to a challenge. Exactly what I was hoping for.

More flower pics, sorry but I'm on a roll so these are the ones taken on my first Arboretum trip this Spring. I swear I won't make you sit through any more of this for a while. Several commenters asked about my camera. It is this...

...a Nikon D40x and I highly recommend it. 10.2 megapixels and lots of bells and whistles. I also have a better quality lens for it and use that sometimes, too, but the one that comes with it is plenty fine. Of course as you can probably guess... I do a bit more tweaking in Photoshop, but I have to keep some secrets to myself ya know. Anyway if you're wanting to learn more about Photoshop, you can watch some very helpful video tutorials at Lynda.com, an amazing number of which are free.

So... on to more flowers!

Obviously I am very fond of getting up close and personal with my subject. The first and last blossoms were just a few among thousands on the most amazing magnolia tree I've ever seen. I could have climbed up into it and stayed forever. By the time we went back in less than a week, all the blossoms were gone. Sad. I felt extremely fortunate to have seen it and captured such a fleeting memory with my camera.

Cheers,

Jenny

May flowers

Three cheers! So far there are sixty-three bloggers attempting a post a day in May. I'm so thrilled to have such a nice group joining the fun. There's a handy list over yonder in my right sidebar if you want to check out the gang. Some familiar faces, and the chance to get to know some new ones!

And as promised, some visuals for today. These are photos from our most recent trip to the Arboretum. I made it there twice during the amazing Spring flowering. I can't claim all of these, some were taken by family members, but it was with my camera so I can share them, right? The delphinium pic above is by me for sure*, I may have invented some new yoga poses trying to take closeups of it without actually stepping into the flowerbed. I am insanely in love with that shade of blue.

*um, after some spirited  debate I am convinced that this was actually not taken by me, although I did take several shots of my own in the aforementioned yogic poses.

Orange blossom and orange koi...

A flowering tree...

Poppies so bright the color hurt my eyes through the lens...

A blossom caught in the ridges of a bronze fountain...

And a cardinal dreams he's invisible within a brilliant red Japanese maple...

And those are only from our secondary visit. First time I think I snapped a couple hundred, so steel yourselves... no doubt I'll pull some of those out for another post in May!

Cheers,

Jenny

Granny get your 'ghan!

Yes, I was bitten by the same bug as many other bloggers out there!  I blame Cath Kidston and that adorable crochet afghan she dangled before us last year.  Dredging up my rusty crochet skills - I actually made a granny square afghan in high school - I struggled a bit at first, but now there is a growing pile of squares in the basket I keep near my TV-watching chair.  I found the most wonderful yarn that crochets like buttah - it's Cascade Peruvian wool, and comes in tons of colors and is amazingly affordable!  I don't have much of a yarn stash to speak of.  The colors I chose are not as sophisticated as this, or this, but the finished throw will look smashing in my family room I daresay.  And it will conveniently camouflage my gently aging couch, a definite plus.  I'm feeling more like a follower these days, happily allowing myself to get caught up in the excitement of granny-alongs and such.

I took this photo out in the courtyard, trying to capture a patch of sunshine.  The weekend was glorious, and we took a drive to White Rock Lake where we strolled the shore, looked at the birds and enjoyed the lovely Springy weather along with most of the city.  Note the leaves on the stone wall... Ro spent Sunday afternoon raking up the first wave of leaves that fell from the live oak trees.  By this morning the courtyard is again covered.  Oh well, they are huge, noble trees and despite dropping things almost year round, I love them.

Another pic from the courtyard, one of the little birdhouses on the old fence...

Sorry I've been so lazy about posting.  About the time I get ready to make a post, the phone rings, or my camera battery quits, or I can't find my camera at all!  Next up is another project that so many are working on... a doll quilt!

Cheers,

Jenny

Flora and Fauna

What a week! Since my last post, things have been a total whirlwind. Katy came into town for a long visit, then my folks, and I've had a miserable headache since they left, so, no posts for a while. Sorry gang.

Let's see... a couple of interesting occurrences to report. But first, some eye candy. Katy, Carolyn and I went shopping along Lover's Lane and I brought home this birdhouse:

And since he was between semesters, Jeff dug up the old azeleas across the front of the homestead, and planted new ones, as well as about a zillion and a half impatiens, begonias and ferns among other flora. And I planted several hanging baskets, which at the moment are not exactly hanging yet. Here are pics of the results:

Still with me?  Okay, the first interesting thing that happened was early Thursday morning. Ro got up at 5:30 (can you believe him?) and headed up to the treadmill as usual (grrr). A while later, Lazybutt (me) wandered out, put on the coffee and started to go out the front door and get the paper, but I stopped short at the sight of a half dozen white vans, including one with a huge satelite tower on it, and a local news crew filming on our front sidewalk! Wha? I zipped upstairs and gabbled "Did you realize there is a news team broadcasting from our front lawn?"  Turned out they were from the CBS station doing a report on enforcement of water restrictions. They did broadcasts all morning from our front yard! Yikes! The flowerbeds looked great, with the lone exception of a pile of debris due for cleanup that afternoon. So what was in the camera shots? The crud of course. Ack. No idea why they chose our yard, as it was pitch black when they set up.

And this is the iron bunny who watches over the courtyard, which brings me to the final tale (tail?) of the week. After sightings of cute little bunnies at the Arboretum, we were charmed to see one hopping around the courtyard on Friday afternoon.  We'd never seen one out there, although we had several wild ones at our previous house, along with Peter and Eddie, our pet rabbits who ran loose in the back yard (not recommended). Then Saturday morning we realized the bunny had wreaked havoc on all the new plantings, leaving a trail of pitifully severed stalks! In a nanosecond it went from "that cute little bunny" to "that damn rabbit!" No further damage or sightings since then, but we are armed with a recipe for pepper spray that is reputed to repel the hungry beasts.

I'll post more garden pics on Flickr in a bit.  And there is more stuff going on than I have time to babble about, like Vicky's Finish What You Have, Angry Chicken's May Tie One On gallery, and the soon to be shipped out Club Little House goodies including Alicia's china cabinets (so cute)!

Cheers,

Jenny

Chelsea garden

It must be Spring Fever, I have become obsessed with gardens. Not just any old gardens, but lush, amazing English gardens. These images are of the Chelsea Pensioners Garden at last year's Chelsea Flower Show. I somehow managed to miss attending the year I lived in London, something I've always regretted. But I can visit through these gorgeous pictures, courtesy of Moosey's Country Garden.

Don't you wish you could sit at this table with a pint?

Oh, and are there foxgloves!

There are a few houses in Dallas that manage to achieve this kind of green nirvana, but they are hard to find. Dallas can boast quite a few houses designed by Charles Dilbeck, an architect who created some of the most charming storybook houses around the country. Its one of my dreams to live in one of his houses. When I have time, I'll try to find some examples of his homes.

But... they don't have thatched roofs like this...

Or charm like this:

Maybe someday...

Cheers,

Jenny

Heaven in a blue and white jug

I couldn't resist a bit of self-indulgence at Central Market this morning... three bunches of gorgeous white freesia. The vivid green of the stems looks amazing next to the blue transferware pitcher. And the best part is the smell! If only I could bottle it. Sadly, my skills stop a block short of artful flower arranging. Martha I am not. The best I can manage is to plunk them into water and hope for the best. But somehow freesia always looks perfect.

Yesterday I did a furniture shift, moving the pine Swedish table over by the sunny window in my bedroom, so I was able to set the freesia in the sunshine for its photo op. I must give props to Alicia for her photo-taking tutorial. She suggested switching the camera setting from auto to manual and wow did that make a difference! I couldn't stop snapping. To see more (and bigger) pics, click here to see the set I created on Flickr.

I'll be adding more flower pics later, after the arboretum trip!

Edited to add: The trip to the arboretum was fabulous, the light was beautiful, and the landscape very open and much starker than usual. We photographed more in the way of textures and shapes, but there are a fair number of flower pics, too, especially pansies! I added these to my Flickr set called Flora. Check it out!

Cheers,

Jenny

My place

One of my favorite things is when other bloggers share pics of their place. I love to see what interesting and different kinds of ways people feather their nests. So many styles, from modern to shabby chic, from country cottage to kitsch. Its all so very personal, a reflection of the personality and interests of the homekeeper. So... I'll invite you all into my humble digs, hopefully every Sunday, to take a peek at where I live, work and play!

Today I'd like to take you out into the courtyard. These photos were taken after a rain, when the greens were so vivid and everything looked so lush. I wish it looked like this all the time! These french doors lead out from the family room to the courtyard. From here you can see one of the two gigantic live oak trees that tower over the house, keeping the courtyard continually in shade. Only shade loving plants really like it out here, like ivy, ferns, impatiens and begonias. The bistro tabel and chairs are courtesy of Martha Stewart, by way of K-mart!

Looking back at the french doors and the wall of windows across the back of the family room... When the weather is nice we open the windows from the top and let the sounds of the birds and the wind chimes into the house. I love the sound of birds, but there seem to be fewer and fewer of them every year. I used to have bird feeders out there that I kept stocked with seed, but it led to a massive number of birds, like a scene right out of Hitchcock! Kinda creepy! I only have bird baths out there now, so much of the bird population has moved on. But I do still see lots of cardinals, mockingbirds, robins, wrens and finches, as well as the odd dove and blue jay.

This last image is a view from below the live oak back towards the house. I love to let the asian jasmine grow rather wild, along with the ivy that fills most of the beds. There is a stone wall around the old tree that you have probably seen in some of the photos I've taken of softies. The tree's roots have taken their toll and the wall is developing some cracks and a few stones have become loose, but it has so much character I really wouldn't want to fix it. I love how it looks almost like an ancient stone wall now.

This will be a very busy week, and I'm not sure if I'll have much time to post. I've got a ton of work, which is why I haven't been posting much recently. Next weekend is also my local SCBWI conference, and I have to get my portfolio up to date because I have a meeting with an art director from Henry Holt! Wish me luck!

Hope you liked this visit to my home. I'd love to see some pics of your place, too!

Cheers,

Jenny